5 Productivity Tips You Can Apply to Your Business Today

Typically, small business owners have fewer resources at their disposal than larger organisations. Therefore, improving efficiency and productivity should always be at the forefront of every project to ensure success.

We’ve highlighted 5 tips you can apply to your business today to improve productivity:

1. Throw out the long to-do list

If you were to write out a to-do list right now, just how long would it be?

To-do lists are generally long and made up of ad hoc items with no reference to your short and long-term goals. You aren’t able to track if you are doing the right things.

At GrowFactor, we implement the Tony Robbins Three to Thrive technique. Every morning each team member identifies what three things they can do that day to have a successful day. However, for the technique to work you need to select realistic daily targets that enable you to reach your ultimate goals.

For example, your ultimate goal might be ‘bring in £100k in sales revenue by end of Q1.’ Therefore, your three to thrive wouldn’t be ‘hit the sales target for Q1’ if you are only two days into the quarter! Instead, it might be:

Review sales dashboard

Reach out to 5 leads that haven’t signed off their proposal yet

Upsell additional services to 2 clients

Make sure to evaluate your successes daily.

2. Cut out the noise

It is easy to be distracted by the constant noise of email, instant messaging, social media and phone calls. If you react to every message straight away you’ll end up reacting instead of achieving your outcomes for the day. Not only will this decrease your efficiency but you’ll also finish your day feeling unaccomplished.

Instead, only check your emails and messages 3 times a day and don’t do your first check until 11am. You’ll be surprised just how productive you can be when you aren’t stuck in your inbox.

3. A day of no meetings

Meetings during your work week are inevitable. However, you can structure them to have a positive impact on your productivity.

Schedule a ‘no-meeting day’ every week in your diary or alternatively block out ‘no-meeting time’ within days. This will allow you to have uninterrupted time to focus on your priorities for the week, instead of having unpredictable gaps between meetings that results in a project being started but ultimately not finished.

Make sure to update any online diary links you may have and communicate your meeting structure with your team so that you don’t find an unexpected meeting request appear in your diary.